The Face of Jakarta in 2030

Tempo Magazine -WILL Jakarta be a pleasant place to live in 2030? The Jakarta government predicts that Jakarta’s population will exceed 10 million people. Jakarta’s heavy population burden will spread to its satellite towns. The city which now has an estimated 9.5 million inhabitants will become one of 20 megacities as well as one of the economic centers of the world.

The city spatial and environmental plan for Jakarta from 2010 to 2030 should provide guidelines for the public as to how the city will reach those aims. However, until today the draft regional legislation is still being discussed in the Provincial House of Representatives, the DPRD. Meanwhile the city is still caught in a mass of problems which remain the same from year to year: traffic congestion, flooding, pollution, poor public transportation systems and bad public facilities.

There are several points in the draft city plan for 2010—2030 which provide a picture of Jakarta in 2030 but many observers are pessimistic that these will ever be carried out. Since 1965 the government has three times prepared draft city plans but their implantation has never been successful.

The following is a list of targets set out in the draft city plan:

1. Transportation

This will be based on transit-oriented development which will be implemented by increasing the means of transport by building more railway tracks, roads and waterway facilities.

2. The Environment

Improve city areas by increasing public open green spaces by 14.25 percent of the total Jakarta area. Such areas that are privately held will be increased by 20.24 percent. The total area of open green spaces in Jakarta is currently 9.6 percent of the area of Jakarta.

Improving coastal areas, the reclaimed north coast areas, riverbanks, water reservoirs and lakes.

Improving the capacity of sewers and canals to prevent flooding in the city.

Provide adequate systems for the dispersal of rainwater as well as sufficient drainage systems.

Increased construction of high-rises as well as increased extraction of groundwater is causing the surface of the city to sink 10-20 centimeters a year.

There are now nearly 700 high-rise building and 130 shopping malls in Jakarta. Jakarta is now the city with the most shopping malls in the world.

Increase in high-rise buildings has not been met by a sufficient increase in the supply of clean water from the water companies. The amount of clean water now required is 925 million cubic meters a year, whereas the current supply is only 250 million cubic meters of water. The remainder of the clean water is taken from groundwater.

Transport systems in Jakarta contribute 19.61 million tons of carbon emissions a year. This means that Jakarta produces 9,593 grams of carbon emissions per capita per day compared to 7,942 grams per capita per day nationally.

The average speed of motor vehicles in Jakarta is only 8.3 kph. Five years ago it was 18 kph. What has caused this is that the increase in roads has only been 0.01 percent per year whereas the amount of motor vehicles on the roads has increased by 9.5 percent.

Jakarta’s Problems

Lack of open green spaces has caused the amount of rainwater that cannot be absorbed to reach 60.38 percent of the volume of the rain hitting Jakarta in a year.

Construction of a mass rapid transit (MRT) system is constantly being postponed. Construction should have begun three years ago. However, this has stretched to 2012. If all goes well, it will be another six years before the inhabitants of Jakarta are able to use it.

Residents of Jakarta can use up 60 percent of their time on the road stuck in traffic jams. In 2009 Time magazine crowned Jakarta as the best place in the world to learn patience.

Density of traffic on the roads has caused the length of time of traffic jams to reach 8-10 hours a day.

The Trans Jakarta Busway system which has been in effect since January 2004 is not capable of decreasing traffic congestion. It only has a capacity to transport 250,000 commuters a day along 10 corridors using 524 buses. Whereas the transportation needs in Jakarta are 20.7 million journeys a day for 9.5 million inhabitants.

Available open green spaces are only 9.6 percent of the 66 square kilometers that make up the area of Jakarta. The proportion of land that has buildings on it compared to open green spaces is 74:26 which has resulted in an increase of temperature in the city to 31.48 degrees Celsius from 26.48 degrees Celsius in 1940.

Comfortable Living

MERCER, a company that surveys the most comfortable cities to live in in the world says that there are 10 criteria regarding living conditions in a city that they research. One of them is the quality of public transport and the environment. It is because of this that European cities still dominate the list of the most comfortable cities in the world. Vienna holds first place as the city with the best quality of living for its inhabitants in 2010. Second and third place was taken by two cities in Switzerland—Zurich and Geneva.

The comfort of living in Asia went down last year as threats of violence and terrorism rose. Mercer sees this trend in Asia increasing. Added to this several places in Asia are very prone to natural disasters such as earthquakes, storms and typhoons. Auckland in New Zealand was chosen as the most comfortable city in the Asia Pacific region to live in.

The Union of Design Experts once carried out a similar survey in 15 of the largest cities in Indonesia. Jakarta came out very low on the list. Its residents’ feeling of living comfortably in Jakarta was only 54.26 percent. What triggered such a low level of satisfaction was foremost inadequate public facilities, a lack of space and increased crime rates.